


Halcyon Days

by Werepirechick



Series: Girls get it done, can't deny that. [2]
Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, Adulthood, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Family Fluff, Family Loss, Fluff, Future Fic, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Growing Up, Loss of Parent(s), Post-Canon, Sibling Bonding, Siblings, Thanks, and get to this point, everyone is happy and grown up, i have faith they can work their shit out one day, i think this would have been a nice way for things to work out, or: how canon should have done a leorai relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-28
Updated: 2017-03-28
Packaged: 2018-10-12 06:14:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10483998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Werepirechick/pseuds/Werepirechick
Summary: Ten years after Splinter's passing, Karai returns to New York to visit his grave, and to visit the family she found through that loss.





	

**Author's Note:**

> sequel to 'Serpent, Dragon, and Witch' in a sense, since I'm basically placing this ten years after that particular fic.
> 
> can be read as a standalone though, since it's a relatively basic formula of future-fic stuff.

 

 

Karai leans her head back against her seat, idly watching the country side rush past her window. She blinks slowly, eyes feeling tired from the abrupt time change she’s experienced coming back to America. The sounds of April and Shinigami in the front seats chatting quietly further soothes her nerves, because their familiar voices have long since become staples in her life, and she can always depend on them to anchor her.

Karai feels their car turn, and shifts her weight as they begin the journey up the farm house driveway. April’s voice picks up a note of excitement, and Karai smiles to herself at the red head’s eagerness to see the other half of their family.

As they keep driving, Karai sees the car following them suddenly stop and then park in the middle of the road. It’s one of four in the area, with three or two Foot soldiers in each. Extra protection, just to ensure they aren’t interrupted during the celebration.

Karai’s men and women are good soldiers, now that they’ve served a solid ten years under her reign as clan leader. She made sure that none of them were anything less than perfect, and knows she can trust her chosen subordinates to guard the perimeter. She can let go of her constant vigilance, at least for tonight.

Karai eases the last of her leaderly stress from her mind, and finds herself grinning as the farm house comes into view at last. Just a fourteen hour flight from Japan, and then four hour drive from New York, and they’re finally here.

The hulking, nightmarishly sized bipedal crocodile and similarly giant, but still much smaller, bipedal gecko in the front yard are welcome sights. Even more so as they raise the alarm that Karai, Shini, and April have arrived, and a flood of impossible beings pours out of the house.

Before Shini has even parked the car fully, April is unbuckling herself and flying out the passenger door. Karai chuckles as her third in command runs across the lawn like she’s fifteen and not nearly thirty, and flings herself at the collection of turtle brothers and the lone human in their odd group. It’s always a sight to see, the six of them reuniting. And the obvious affection the boys have for April is always clear in the way they hug her, and in how they, very often, sweep her off her feet to be passed around for even _more_ hugs.

Karai knows she’ll be getting a similar treatment, the moment she gets out of the car, and she smiles as her brothers catch sight of her setting foot on the grass.

She shuts the car door behind her, and catches Mikey as he barrels towards her. He’s always the first, because despite having grown taller than her, he kept the lightning speed he’d had as a teen. Followed quickly is Leo, then Raph, and finally Donnie, who is so tall these days, he has to stoop to hug her properly.

The Mutanimals, an even odder collection than Karai’s siblings are, begin to encroach on the reunion. Now that Karai is here, with April returned to her boys, and Shini’s arm winding around Karai’s waist, everyone is accounted for.

“Welcome back,” Leo says over the clamor of everyone talking, smiling wide enough his left eye’s scar crinkles.

“Good to be back,” Karai replies truthfully, returning a smile just as wide.

Mikey then exclaims loudly over the group’s noise _“THE PIZZA-BURGERS!”_ and makes a mad dash back towards the house. Karai guesses that whatever ‘pizza-burgers’ are, it’s what she’s having for dinner. After spending months without tasting Mikey’s… _curious_ cooking style, Karai figures she can handle whatever abomination her brother has created _this time._ If only for him to be happy.

Leatherhead lumbers after Mikey first, Mondo trailing along with him, and then their group disbands completely. Karai follows Leo back into the house, keeping her fingers laced with Shini as Shini chats with- or more accurately- teases Casey.

The house is loud, and too full of moving bodies, and smells like grit and dampness; courtesy of all the less than human inhabitants. Karai winds her way through the crowd, minding Slash’s spiky shell, and stepping over the ever growing, pit-bull sized Chompy who gallops between the legs of everyone. Shini’s hand doesn’t leave her’s, and when they finally make it to the couch for a breather, the farm house has returned to being packed to the gills with guests, and there is barely a chance of being able to hear one’s self think.

Karai drinks in the dissonant chaos of it all, relaxes with Shini as Leo goes to get them tea, and enjoys being with her strange family once more.

Later, when things have become a bit more organized, and Karai drifts from the party. She opens the backdoor of the house, leaving behind the lights and warmth of friends and family, and goes out into the late spring evening.

She approaches the gravestone, set in front of a shady tree, and kneels quietly in the grass. No moss or discoloration has grown on its surface, mostly likely due to upkeep and care from Karai’s younger brothers.

It’s been a full decade now, and Karai sighs as an old hurt rises once again. She bows her head for a moment, and closes her eyes as she kneels at her father’s grave.

After a soft, unspoken prayer, Karai lifts her head to look at the words carved into the stone before her. They still read the same as they had when she’d first seen it, but she reads them again regardless. There is always a chance she won’t be able to see it again for herself, living the life she does. It’s best to make the most of this moment while it’s here.

Quiet wind blows through the grass, rustling it as the world cools towards night. Fresh spring life fills Karai’s senses, and because she has spent the last months smelling only city grit, she darts out her forked tongue to properly taste the sweet air. A moment of inhumanity, accepted and welcome in the current company she’s keeping.

She hears purposefully made footsteps come up behind her, and Karai turns her head.

Leo stands in the low evening light, holding plates of food for himself and Karai, and he smiles down at her.

“Feeling hungry?” He asks, offering a plate to her.

Karai smiles, brushing away her years old sadness, and takes the plate of dubious food. “I think the better term would be ‘feeling adventurous?’”

Leo winces and then laughs, because Karai is right. There is always a fifty-fifty chance whatever Mikey has made will be near poisonous, and why they keep letting him cook is a mystery to Karai.

Of course, as she bites into the meaty, cheesy, saucy patty on bun, she remembers why they do, and enjoys her supper.

There are already offerings placed around their father’s grave, flowers and wreaths, and a lone picture frame with the single family photo they ever managed to take. Among all the chaos of wars and fighting, there had been an evening, once, where Karai had deigned to stay in the lair for more than a few minutes. Someone had found a camera, that someone being April, and had taken a photo of Karai, her brothers, and their father all together.

It’s a messy photo. Raph’s arms are half blurred as he wrestles with Mikey, and Leo’s face is a priceless look of panic as he dodges the sudden quarrel. Karai and Donnie, standing together to the side of the fight, have matching looks of unimpressed condescension, and she figures it’s an obvious sign of their relation.

Their father, in a rare moment outside his stoic nature, is smiling at them all in a warm, amused manner. It’s the only photo they have of him smiling so freely in, with Karai in the shot as well. It goes on the grave every year, when they all gather to celebrate Splinter’s life, and is taken home again when they part ways once more.

Karai has a copy of it, in her main sleeping quarters, in her main base, and she smiles every time she sees it. That doesn’t change now; looking at the original print, set against the grave of the father she never got to know.

Karai finishes eating with Leo on the grass in front of the grave, and they talk about their lives recently. How many dimensions Leo and his brothers have traveled to lately, how many misadventures they’ve had in those dimensions, how many clans have attempted to challenge Karai’s power hold of Japan, and how many of those she’s destroyed or taken into the Foot’s territory. Normal things, for them at least.

“So how has Pimiko been doing lately?” Leo asks, leaning back comfortably on his hands. “Last I heard, she’d caused a full scale revolt in one of your training camps.”

Karai rolls her eyes at the mention of her potential successor. “She didn’t succeed with that one, as hard as she tried. We managed to get her and her preteen army when they tried to capture the kitchens. And she’s actually been behaving really well lately. Though, I’m also suspicious of whether or not she’s planning another coup.” Karai grimaces to herself. “Who knew twelve year olds were such a handful?”

Leo laughs at that, voice filled with humor and just a hint of roughness. The scars on his neck and chest still stand out, even after time has dulled them. Similar scars had once crossed Karai’s chest as well, from the same blades, the same enemy, but she’s long since shed that skin. Literally. The perks, she supposes, of being a mutant snake woman.

“One of these days, she might actually succeed in overthrowing you,” Leo says, teasing quirk to his smile.

“She can try,” Karai says with a hint of dry humor. When she’d picked Pimiko up off the streets, brought her into the folds of an ancient ninja clan in hopes she’d become more than a street fighter, Karai hadn’t been expecting just how _difficult_ or _strong-willed_ she’d turn out to be.

One of these days, Pimiko likely would overthrow Karai’s reign of the Foot clan. And when that day came, Karai would lower the kabuto onto her head willingly, and feel utterly proud of the spit-fire she’d raised.

But, that is not a day coming soon, because Pimiko is small and reckless still, and Karai can beat her six different ways in as many seconds.

“How’s your side of things been, then?” Karai asks, shifting the subject.

“Oh you know, same old same old,” Leo says with a shrug. “Three brothers to keep track of, plus Casey, dimension hopping every second day, negotiation of non-terran supplies with our space duplicates. The usual. Space Casey and Donnie blew up a small moon the other day. It nearly caused the destruction of a whole ecosystem.”

“Sounds hectic,” Karai comments in an amused tone. She leans onto her knees as she draws them up, and tilts her head. “You five planning on going up again any time soon? I have some material requests for space Donnie.”

“I’m sure he’ll be more than happy to provide,” Leo says, closing his eyes and sighing. “Sometimes, I wonder about those six up there. I can’t imagine what led them to being _space pirates_ of all things, as interesting as that sounds.” Leo pauses for a moment, and then says, “Maybe I can get space me to switch places again. I want a vacation.”

Karai scoffs a laugh. “You’re nearly thirty, and yet, still such a space nerd.”

Leo tilts his chin upwards in a haughty motion, and replies, “I’ll have you know I’m a very serious leader fifty percent of the time. I’m allowed to use the other fifty percent for space enthusiasm.”

Karai elbows Leo, and he elbows her back. It’s a nice exchange, since skype calls will only communicate so much of the back and forth affection they want to express. You can’t elbow your brother through a screen, after all.

Leo notices then, the ring on Karai’s finger, and his eye ridges move upwards behind his ever present blue mask. “That’s new. When did that happen, exactly?”

Karai puts her hand over the smooth metal on her ring finger, and smiles fondly. “Two days ago. Shini wanted to wait for our anniversary, but Pimiko… might’ve gotten into things she wasn’t supposed to, and spoiled the surprise.”

“Congratulations!” Leo says happily, moving over enough to put an arm around Karai’s shoulders. He gives her a tight squeeze as he holds up her hand to see the ring better. “You promised you tell us right away when it happened, though. I’m disappointed in you. _Mikey_ will be disappointed in you.”

Karai rolls her eyes, and gives Leo’s side another elbow. “It was _two days,_ you nosy busybody. I was going to tell you all tonight.”

“I’m surprised April didn’t spill to Donnie and Casey,” Leo remarks, releasing Karai’s hand again. “It’s hard for them to keep anything from each other.”

“April is a full kunoichi, she can keep a secret for at least a few days.”

“And yet, everyone always knows what they’re getting for Christmas anyways.”

“Touché.”

There’s a comfortable pause after that, during which the muted sounds from their family inside is all that’s heard. It’s a nice sort of pause, though. Familiar because of how long it’s been since they were children, and how long they’ve now known one another.

A gentle grief wells in Karai suddenly, and she sighs as she looks at the photo of their family. “I wish I’d gotten to spend more time with him. I only knew him for a year and a half maybe, and I only got a handful of days with him, really.”

Leo’s arm tightens again, and Karai puts her own across his shell.

“I know,” He says, quiet and tinged with grief. “I wish that too. I think you two would have had a lot in common.”

“Oh yeah?” Karai asks dubiously, looking at the rat man in the photos. “How so?”

“Well. You’re both terrible about confiding your fears in others, and about asking for help, and about being stubborn, and-”

“Oh _shut up,”_ Karai groans, shoving Leo off of her. He falls sideways, laughing, and she responds to his mockery by getting larger than him.

Her second form, sleek and powerful as always, glides over her human body to elongate it. In a mere second, Karai is twice Leo’s size, and can comfortably flop over him so he can’t escape.

“You _always_ do this,” Leo grumbles from under Karai’s coils, sounding like his younger self had whenever Karai would beat him at something.

Karai hisses a laugh, and shifts her long body enough for Leo to sit up again. She stays coiled around him though, comfortable to have the security of the position. There are so many mixed and crossed wires in her brain, courtesy of her mutation, and somehow, even in this reptilian form, she feels even more protective of those close to her.

Karai tastes the sweet air of the evening again, and lowers her head- _heads_ \- to lie on her top most coils. Leo settles, apparently resigned to being captured, and pats the closest snake head/hand to him. Karai shuts her eyes, and enjoys his company while she has it.

With sea and continents between them, it’s rare for her to see her brothers more than a few times each year. Running an empire requires so much attention; Karai can’t afford to take many vacations. When she does though, they’re always either to France, because her fiancée is a huge fashion fanatic, or back here. To her first real home, with her first real family.

“So when’s the date?” Leo asks after a while, still absently stroking Karai’s scales. “I’d like to know when I have to corral everyone and drug them long enough to ship overseas.”

Karai hums, thinking happily of the event coming soon. “In a few months. It’ll be quiet thing, on the Hamato estate. No fuss, probably no assassination attempts. I’ll send tranq darts and the times for a private jet flight when I get back.”

“I’m happy for you two,” Leo says, a warm smile in his voice. “It’s good to see you getting to be happy, Karai.”

Karai hums again, and thinks the same. “You’re happy too, Leo. Gallivanting across space and time with your brothers and friends still. Obviously a very satisfying career of heroics.”

“I’d like to think so,” Leo replies. “I’m not sure what else I’d do with my life if we weren’t.”

“You’d find something.”

“Probably, yeah.”

They sit in silence for a while after that, enjoying the spring air and nighttime sky. Enjoying being able to let down their guards completely for a night, and be close to someone who won’t potentially stab them in the back. And, the chance to share mutual grief and love for someone they’ve lost.

Karai opens her eyes for a second, to look at Leo, who is slouched in a relaxed manner against her coils. His eyes closed and breathing even. She looks at the scars he’s gained over the years, and though some carry hardships, most carry assurance that they’re all still alive.

After Splinter had passed, and especially after April had chosen to join the Foot clan, Leo had become withdrawn. It’d been a hard fight to bring him back to himself, but now, years after that fight, Leo’s complexion no longer has sallow grief, and he carries himself strong and proud.

They’d had their fights during his darkest period, during which Karai wasn’t sure how to help him, and it had been a few years before they found easy ground again. But, they had, and now they are here. Content with how their lives have gone, and content with being close to one another once more.

Karai closes her eyes, and smiles at how well they’ve both grown up. The first months of running over rooftops together seem far off now, and yet like they’d only happened yesterday. Karai thinks she might be getting a bit old and sentimental, but here, with her brother, she thinks that’s just fine by her.

The cooling evening air isn’t cold enough to drive them inside yet, so Karai settles back into a pleasant drowse. At peace beside her father’s grave, and more than comfortable with her younger brother.

Then, in a complete disruption of the quiet atmosphere, something goes crashing out the backdoor of the house, and causes both Karai and Leo to startle out of their comfy pile.

Raph and April shriek at one another as they spar across the lawn, and Casey plus Donnie are hot on their tail as they encourage the brawl. More spectators follow them out; Slash and Leatherhead carefully extricating themselves out the door, with Mondo, Pigeon Pete, Dr Rockwell, and Chompy tagging along behind. Shini and Mikey rush out after them, both of them looking all too pleased with themselves, and likely being the original culprits of the erupting chaos. Mr. O’Neil wanders out last, after the group of insanity clears the way, and watches the procession from the porch step with a resigned and mildly anxious expression.

There are throwing stars and flying cutlery being tossed through the air, bets being placed on which red colored fighter will win, and an air of excitement and good-natured fun. Also hollering for blood and gore, from Casey, Mikey, and Shini, but that’s beside the point.

Karai huffs softly, watching her fiancée and commanding officer make fools of themselves, and thinks that this is why they should come home more often.

“We should probably break that up,” Leo says calmly, watching his brother and April attempt to beat each other into paste.

“Probably,” Karai says equally as calm, as April starts to get the advantage, and flips Raph off his feet in a sweep of psychic power. Bets are yelled over the ruckus of Raph’s cussing, and it seems the favor of the crowd has turned to April.

“I’m putting ten on April,” Karai says.

“I have five on Raph.”

“What, no equal bet?”

“He’s Raph, and she’s April. I’m not losing money I don’t have, because he’s definitely going to lose.”

April flips up into the air, eliciting a wave of cheers from the crowd, and narrowly misses driving her heel into Raph’s chest as he rolls away.

“That’s fair,” Karai says, smiling with her thin silver lips. “I’ll call her off when he knows he’s been beaten.”

“Raph _never_ knows when he’s beaten, though,” Leo points out.

“Exactly,” Karai chuckles.

Leo laughs, and stands up slowly from their pile. Karai unwinds herself, and follows him towards the jostling crowd of mutants and humans. She shifts from slithering to walking as she does, and wraps her arms around Shini’s midriff when she reaches her. There’s barely a pause to quickly kiss Karai’s cheek, and Shini goes right back to encouraging April to demolish Raph. Karai rolls her eyes, and grins as April and Raph keep fighting.

The fury of two trained ninjas, and the cheering of too many over-enthused observers, fills the air of what most would consider a somber event. But ever since the first time Karai visited her father’s grave, none have been that. With her family, there is always life, always insanity. Never a dull moment, and hardly a pause for real sadness.

It’s a warm and familiar feeling, being with them, and with her fiancée held close, Karai wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> rat dad is dead and i wish i missed him more than i do. (see These Days by me on my profile to see Why i don't miss him.)
> 
> on the other hand though, while current leo and karai are relatively toxic for each other (encouraging their reckless streaks, leo guilting/shaming karai for making decisions any good ninja would, etc etc) i do like the idea of them eventually coming together in a solid adopted/half-sibling relationship. i'm incredibly weak for sibling type relationships in general, and the idea of these two getting to that point tempts me so.
> 
> also: shinirai. i love it, and i will never ever stop writing it.
> 
> also also: april running off to become a fierce and respected ninja warrior makes me fucking LIVE, and i will also never stop writing that.
> 
> also also also: pimiko is the shredder's daughter in one of the iterations, so i thought it'd be neat to cast her as karai/shini's adopted rebellious daughter in this fic. i should write her into a fic one day, since i love her already.
> 
> that's all the also's i have, thanks for stopping by and reading my sibling hurt/comfort fluff.


End file.
